Pick Me
by FreedomFighter12345
Summary: In a whirlwind of uncontrollable lust, dangerous obsessions, and overflowing emotions, four students (football jock Jean Kirschtein, honor student Armin Arlert, music/theatre dork Marco Bodt, and the military-driven Eren Jeager) searching for love attempt to find it while dealing with the stress of their final year of High School. (Will have every possible pairing of the four!)
1. Chapter 1

_**A/N: Hi this my first time writing anything like this and I just really love this show and this story and after I wrote this I just felt the need to upload it so please enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing it. If you're ignorant or immature, don't even bother reading this, because you might not be able to handle what you read. But I really encourage you to read it, otherwise. I put a lot of work into this, including creating another email and a random account name and whatnot just so I can ensure my anonymity. Now for relevant stuff: this is a high school AU that includes adult tones and themes (no I won't be writing porn), so be wary of that. It's rated T for a reason. Should probably be T+, but that's whatever. Will include: Jean/Marco, Jean/Armin, Eren/Armin, Jean/Eren, Eren/Marco, Armin/Marco. When I say every possible pairing, I meant it. May include other things too, but I haven't decided. Anyways, too much talking. Time to get to the story! **_

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Damn, Marco thought to himself, looking at a digital clock with "7:19" illuminated on the front. Hastily grabbing his brand new backpack, he took in the fresh aroma of his entirely new outfit before running out of his house into the quiet morning air.

It was September 2nd, and also the first day of classes for students at New Rose High School. For Marco, it was his last first day of high school. Today marked the beginning of his senior year, and after an incredibly demanding junior year schedule toppled with a personally stressful summer, he was surprisingly beyond ready to go back to school. He figured it would actually be a fun year, considering he dropped the majority of his academic classes (besides English, of course) for the opportunity to take electives that entertained his interests, such as choir and theatre. Deciding to put the past month of depression behind him, he eagerly made his way to begin a fresh year at New Rose. However, the fact that he was running a little late on the first day was slightly off-putting to him. Still, he simply fastened his walking pace and smiled to himself. "I really think that this might be a good year after all," he said aloud.

Arriving at school earlier than expected, he still had 7 minutes to spare before classes began. He began his day with an hour and a half of theatre class, which was exciting for him because Marco LOVED to perform. Deciding not to take part in athletics after his freshman year, Marco had focused on his acting and singing abilities over the past few years in order to bring them to as close to perfection as possible. Marco was pretty well known around the area for his acclaim in the performing arts, often winning/placing in both local and state competitions for various things such as Shakespeare and musical theatre. Driven by a need to succeed, his notable effort produced consistent results. Despite his success, Marco hadn't been too happy as of late. His social skills had declined over the past year; certainly he was still as friendly as ever, and often had his bright freckled smile planted sweetly on his face, but something about him was just kind of...sad.

With a few minutes left still to go before class began, Marco made his way towards the theatre where his first class took place. The droopy aura that Marco often had been giving off lately seemed to be gone. Actually, Marco felt pretty excited to start his senior year; who doesn't love the idea of ultimate authority over underclassmen? As he continued towards his class, he came across a large group of his friends who were gathered in front of a strip of alternating crimson and teal-colored lockers. Marco chuckled to himself as he saw slightly intimidated sophomores and juniors attempt to inch their way around the group of seniors without bothering them.

"Hey Marky!" screamed Sasha, Pop-Tart in hand. This was no surprise, as she was always eating something, no matter how not-okay it might have been to be doing so when or where she was. Alas, she was just one of those girls who would never get fat, no matter what they ate.

Ymir and Christa turned around. "Oh hey, Marco!" They both said simultaneously, though Christa much more enthusiastically than Ymir. "I saw your schedge on Insta yesterday, we have theatre together next!" Christa continued, an illuminating smile shining across her face.

"Hey guys," Marco said, waving enthusiastically to his friends. "Awesome, Christa! Anyone else I have classes with?"

"Well, I know Eren has theatre first with us, too," Christa replied.

Sasha spoke up behind her, mouth filled with crumbling Pop-Tart. "Foods, third!" she managed to mumble.

"We have gym and English together," Ymir spoke up, her voice friendly but stern. "Mikasa, Eren, and Mina are in our English class. Mikasa's also in our gym class, along with Reiner and Bertholdt."

"And me!" Connie exclaimed. Marco didn't even realize he was there, considering he was basically hiding behind Ymir due to his short stature. "Oh yeah, Jean's in our gym class too!"

Jean.

The name struck a nerve, but Marco continued on as if nothing happened.

"Nice, nice," Marco said, his face still beaming a smile. "I guess I'll find out who else is in my classes as I go along."

"Yeah, hopefully you don't have too many freshmen in your shitton of electives," a familiar voice said, revealed to be Eren who had come up from behind him, with his sister Mikasa at his side. Marco and Eren were never really close until this summer, when he started to hang out with him and Armin a lot more before-

And then his heart dropped. It dropped so quickly and so deeply that it was almost impossible to not notice Marco's genuine grin turn to a powerful grimace.

"Morning, guys." A tall, masculine boy donned with chestnut-colored hair strolled up to the group of friends, with a shorter blonde boy close by his side. As they approached the group, their hands often brushed nonchalantly against one another, causing Marco to look away towards the lockers next to him, noticing that one sophomore was still attempting to inch his way to his locker.

"Hey, Jean, Armin," Connie said to the taller and shorter boys, respectively. "Great to be back, eh?"

"Yeah, it was a nice break from the incredible workload of last year, but I'm looking forward to having something to do all the time again," Armin said, seemingly genuinely interested in returning to his studies.

"Isn't that what Jean's for though?" Ymir said, smirking. The group laughed; well, everyone but Marco of course. Marco just stared down the hallway, trying to guess how many of the students that passed by him were freshmen. But, even though he wasn't looking, he could feel the heat of Jean and Armin's blushing. He wished that heat would cause him to erupt in flames and be reduced to ash right that very second.

"Fuck you, Ymir." Jean's voice sounded playful, but also defensive. Marco decided to turn back towards the group, not wanting to appear as if he was purposely avoiding conversation.

"Good morning, Armin." Mikasa walked right up to Armin, almost dragging Eren at her side. Marco noticed that the expression that had suddenly appeared on Eren's face wasn't too different than his own. But it's not like that mattered to him right now anyways. Marco simply tried to avoid talking to Jean at all costs.

Unfortunately, that was much easier said than done. As soon as Mikasa and Eren had reached Armin, Jean had likewise reached Marco. Now unable to pay attention to anything else around him, Marco looked straight up at Jean, who stared him down with worry and confusion.

"What's with you today, Marco? Is everything alright?"

_No, it's not, please leave me alone and go away._ "Yeah, I'm fine, great actually!" Marco decided to lie, and his freckled face burst into a beautiful smile once more, but this time, the depressing aura he gave off was extremely prominent. Luckily for him, Jean didn't notice.

"Alright, buddy," Jean said, tapping Marco's arm with his hand. Marco felt his arm begin to burn from the touch. He pulled it back a little, trying to figure out what to say to Jean. A billion unspeakable things popped into his head. He needed a distraction, fast before-

The sound of the bell echoed through the halls of New Rose High School.

"I'll see you later, Jean," Marco said abruptly, speedily turning around and walking away from his friends, away from Jean, away from his sadness. But, he was tugged back by his wrist and unwillingly turned around.

"Wait, Marco," Jean began. Thousands of thoughts entered and exited Marco's mind as he imagined what Jean could possibly tell him. "I really miss you. I barely got to see you at all over the past month, and you're my fucking best friend. Can we please hang out soon? I mean, we don't have to hang out with Armin or Eren, it can be just the two of us, just like we always used to."

"Sure," Marco said with fake enthusiasm. "Of course. I gotta go though, I'll talk you later, 'kay?" And with that, Marco turned around and sped towards the theatre, furiously holding back the raging current of tears that welled up in his eyes.

* * *

When the second bell rang, Marco sat in the center section of the house seats, in the 3rd row from the front on the isle. Next to him sat Christa, and next to her, Armin and Eren. Marco didn't know Armin would be in this class, but even if he did, he still would have taken the class. It's not like he had anything against Armin personally; it was the situation that had Marco being emotionally torn apart piece by piece. It started over the summer. Marco and Jean and Armin and Eren had been hanging out in a group almost on a daily basis. Sometimes, they were just hanging out over someone's house and doing nothing interesting in particular, but other times, they were getting themselves into deep trouble on dangerous adventures. At first, it was just a good time for the four of them. Eren and Jean had seemingly put aside their differences thanks to Armin's respectable mediation abilities, and together they all actually had fun. Considering the fact that their school interests were completely varied, some thought it was weird that the four were such good friends. And it's true; it was weird. But, the four of them had grown up together, knowing each other since preschool. So, even if they disliked one another, they knew everything there was to know about each other.

After a few weeks of hanging out, however, Marco began to notice a change in Jean. Before they started hanging out in groups, Marco and Jean had been hanging out for years. Through all of their ups, downs, and incredibly awkward and uncomfortable moments (some of which even Marco himself has tried to forget), nothing could put a serious dent in their friendship.

But come mid-July, that changed. Unbeknownst to Marco, Jean and Armin had been hanging out by themselves for quite sometime. Armin was openly gay, and had been so since freshman year; he waited until high school to come out because he figured he'd have to deal with less ignorance, which was true. Even though he was gay, Armin was still relatively popular, especially amongst the prissy honor students, despite him not being prissy at all. Armin certainly had his feminine traits, but he was in no way girly, as society tends to depict guys who are homosexual. Armin had actually inspired Marco to the point of almost coming out himself in his junior year, but decided not to do so for reasons not even he was sure of. Meanwhile, Jean was the star quarterback of the football team. He was the farthest thing from gay, in the eyes of someone who is ignorantly judgmental. But Marco knew otherwise. He knew that Jean wanted to experiment with guys. He knew that Jean wasn't as perfectly straight as everyone thought him to be. And he knew that Jean wanted to know what it was like to have a boyfriend. Over his high school years, this gave Marco the slightest bit of hope that maybe he would be able to realize his romantic dreams. But, once Jean and Armin started hanging out, things changed. And when Jean quite randomly told Marco that he and Armin were officially dating, any bit of living optimism inside Marco was slaughtered mercilessly. However, as Jean's best friend, Marco pretended to be happy for Jean, happy for Armin, happy for their happiness. He supported Jean as he came out publicly as bisexual, and fought alongside him when previous members of his football team tried to jump him because of his newly-exposed sexuality (they were subsequently expelled from the school and charged with a hate crime). However, it was undeniable that he and Jean began to separate as more of Jean's time and heart was dedicated to Armin. Still, despite the mixture of jealousy, sadness, regret, and anger boiling inside of Marco, he was able to maintain his emotions and put up a front of a happy-go-lucky theatre kid. The aura was always there though, and even when he seemed happiest, it never went away. Inside, Marco knew that he wasn't okay, but there just wasn't anything he could possibly do.

In fact, Armin probably still believed that he and Marco were good friends.

"Morning, class!" Mrs. Ral began, her young and beautiful voice owning the entire theatre as she faced the students from the stage. Marco had been so lost in his thoughts that he hadn't noticed her enter. He turned his attention from himself to her.

"Oh my, it's so great to see so many of you in here this year! I think it's.." She looked down to her clipboard before continuing, "23 of you in here this year! Wow! That means we're gonna have to work fast so we can get everything in! But it's still gonna be so much fun! Oh, right, I forgot to do the whole introduction thingy. For the freshmen and those who might not know me, I'm Mrs. Ral. I'm in charge of the New Rose Theatre Company here at school, as well as all of the curricular theatre-related classes. Hence me being here to teach you. Though I'm your teacher, you don't have to be so formal with me. Most of the returning students are my personal friends." She turned her attention to Marco's row. "Right guys?"

"Of course," Christa said, speaking up for the group of seniors around her.

Mrs. Ral laughed. "Alright, enough chatting, we should get started on testing your summer assignments! Each of you got a letter in the mail saying that you should have a piece ready for the first day. I'll critique it, but don't worry, I won't be mean! I'll just help you improve it so that it will be ready when you test it again in 2 weeks!" She giggled in almost a cackling manner. "Oh, don't worry," she said, noticing all of the worried looks in her audience. "Even if it sucks, I'll make sure it's 10 times better for the next time. Don't you trust me?" She smiled, and with smile as beautiful as hers, you can't help but to trust whatever she says.

"I'll trust anything when you have a body as bangin' as that," Milius said aloud from behind Marco.

"Millius, Pixis' office, now." Mrs. Ral's voice immediately turned stern as she commanded Marco's fellow senior class member to experience the wrath of the hard disciplinary officer of the school, Mr. Pixis. "I'm not taking any crap this year, so if you're thinking of acting out anymore, feel free to switch to another elective. I heard Prehistoric Cultural Studies could use a few more students."

"I'm sorry," sighed Millius, and with genuine worry on his face, he left the theatre.

"Now let's get started with pieces! Who wants to go first?" the teacher said, her face bright once again.

"I will," Armin said. With a nod of approval from Mrs. Ral, Armin got from his seat and Eren hastily moved his legs so that Armin could walk to the stairs to get on the stage. Eren seemed eager to hear Armin's performance. Contrarily, Marco was not, and he sank in his chair.

When Armin reached center stage, all eyes focused on him. Reminded to introduce himself and his piece before starting, he nodded before he spoke. "Hello, my name is Armin Arlert, and today I'll be performing William Shakespeare's Sonnet 18."

'Oh,' Marco thought.

"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?  
Thou art more lovely and more temperate;  
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,  
And summer's lease hath all too short a date;

Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,  
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;  
And every fair from fair sometime declines,  
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;

But thy eternal summer shall not fade,  
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;  
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,  
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st:

So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,  
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee."

When Armin finished, the theatre was filled with applause from his classmates. Even Marco was impressed with Armin's performance; he didn't know that Armin had the capability to perform such an overdone piece so well. But the reason why he was able to do so poked at Marco's mind relentlessly.

"Wow, that was excellent!" Mrs. Ral said, still clapping slowly. "Armin, why haven't you taken my class before this year? You've done the shows, but you should have taken my class too! My biggest point of concern is that you occasionally got so soft that I could barely hear your words, but other than that, job well done!"

"Thank you!" Armin said happily, and walked back to his seat with such enthusiasm that it was almost like Jean had just asked him out for the second time. Marco let the thought run from his mind before turning his head forward again, but not before noticing the same grimace on Eren's face from before.

"Wow Armin, that was incredible!" Christa squealed. "Were you imagining Jean when you were up there?"

The shade of red that overcame Armin's face was the similar to the shade of the burning pit within Marco's heart.

"Alright, who's next?" Mrs. Ral questioned. No one responded. "Oh come on, someone just go? Marco, please?" She asked. He nodded his head and silently made his way towards the stage. Various students squirmed in their seats to find a good watching position; they wanted to see what Marco could really do.

When he reached center stage, he stared forward. The light blinding his vision, he stepped back until he deemed his position appropriate. His gaze remained the same, not looking down at his audience before him. He stared at a giant blank patch of white below the tech booth at the back of the theatre. He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and released.

"Hi. I'm Marco, and I'll be performing an original piece called 'Break Me,'" Marco tried to produce a smile, but could not. Without another word, he began.

"Do it.  
I'm already falling apart.  
The strings that are holding the fragments of my body, mind, and soul together  
Simply need one good tug, one strong pull  
Before I'm officially torn into pieces.  
Each friendly look you give me tugs a little more,  
Each platonic touch of the hand pulls at both sides,  
But, somehow, more is needed to REALLY do the trick." He paused.

"I need you to say it.  
Just say the words.  
I.  
Don't.  
Love.  
You.  
Then, I can finally be at peace.  
I can finally understand.  
I can finally live  
With being broken."

Marco's hidden emotions poured from his mouth as his tears could be held back no more. His classmates cheered, believing that his realistic performance was simply a testament to his acting prowess, but to Marco it was so much more than just that.

He returned to his seat, which was isolated now that Christa had already began to make her way to the stage to go next, passing by some freshman who were simply thankful that they didn't have to follow Marco's performance.

"Thanks for showing me up," Armin stated, jokingly. There was no more obstruction between he and Marco, just the space of an empty seat.

"You did great as well," Marco replied. He gave Armin a smile before facing forward, noticing Christa just reaching the stairs. Hearing a nearby buzz, his eyes can't help but turn towards Armin before seeing his phone light up in his lap.

'Meet me outside the theatre, can't wait to walk you to second block. I love you' the text read, followed by the cute smiling Emoji. On top, the phone signified that the text was from Jean.

Marco immediately stood up and began to walk out. Eren asked why he was leaving, and he said it was a bathroom emergency without being questioned.

Marco quickly crossed the hall and went behind the theatre into the costume/dressing/prop/practice room, which had it's own personal bathrooms within them that were exclusively for the actors. Locking himself in, he quickly removed his flannel shirt and reached into his pocket. He looked in the mirror, watching tears stream down his own face. Feeling nothing but disgust towards the image he saw, he quickly turned around before pulling the razor out of his pocket. Pulling up the sleeve of his undershirt, he closed his eyes before placing the razor to his upper arm. Embracing the feeling of cool metal against his still healing wounds, he barely hesitated before slicing the blades across his flesh, creating shallow wounds that began to drip blood. Turning once more towards the mirror, he put his arm in the sink before looking up at the mirror and seeing the desperate, pitiful expression upon his own face. Quickly looking back down, he let muffle sobs escaped him while watching the flowing of red and feeling the stinging of his cuts take over his body and mind.

"Why not me," Marco whimpered, his barely audible voice peeking through in between sobs. "Jean. Why not me?"

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_**A/N: OH WOW okay that's longer than I expected hahah. Well, I hope to make this multi-chaptered, but it may take me a while to write and upload things because school and whatnot so yeah. But if you want more, please review and favorite and follow or whatever you're supposed to do here (seriously I've only been reading fanfiction for like a month and I just made an account today for the sole purpose of uploading this story). I hope you enjoyed it and can't wait to write more for you. :)**_


	2. Chapter 2

_**A/N: Thank you for the follows/favorites/reviews! It really pushed me to get this done, especially since I only had tonight to do it. I also had an absolutely horrible case of writer's block which sucked miserably but yeah, I apologize if this chapter is a bit of a let down. If it is, let me know, and I'll promise to make sure that the next one is better. Also, I probably should have mentioned this, but I'm making each of the first four chapters center around one character, and afterwards, it's going to be multi-centric. I haven't decided about the order in which I'm gonna do the first four (obviously it started with Marco), but I hope you like them all anyways. Also, I'm sorry there's so much flashback in this and I have no idea how to do flashbacks so it probably sucks but WHATEVER LOL. Anyways, here we go!**_

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Christa was right, and there was no possible way for him to deny it; he was absolutely head over heels for Jean Kirschtein, and he was completely okay with it.

Ever since they started dating, all he could think about was how happy Jean made him. Armin never expected something like this to happen, especially to someone like him, and especially with someone like Jean.

'Love you too(:' he texted back, holding the phone close to his chest as if his phone itself were his own heart. The giddiness inside him was so strong that he didn't even notice Marco get up and walk out. He just slouched in his seat, head facing up towards the ceiling. He wondered what Jean was thinking about right that very second, and hoped it was something about him.

"Hey Armin, you're not even paying attention to the damn performances," Eren said, elbowing his arm and effectively removing him from his Jean-induced trance.

"Ow, that actually kinda hurt asshole," Armin replied, and Eren's immediate downcast look was the only apology he needed. "No don't worry about it," he continued, "it wasn't bad it was just a little bothersome. I was thinking-"

"About Jean." Eren said. "Don't worry, I get it. Just at least watch these kids perform, yeah? I'm sure they didn't put hard work into their practicing just so that people could ignore them on stage."

"Since when did you become so respectful?" Armin said, genuinely questioning of Eren. He thought it to be extremely unusual, as he was usually the one having to scold Eren for his constant disrespect.

"Dunno," Eren said, and returned to face forwards. A freshman girl had just began her piece, and after a few seconds it was already quite clear that she needed serious improvement. Once she finished, Armin had excused himself to go to the bathroom. He needed to get up and move around, for his thoughts had been making him extremely jittery. He didn't actually have to go to the bathroom, but he figured it was at least a good excuse to get up and move. He wasn't one to skip class, either, but he was a senior now and even HE couldn't deny the slight "don't give a fuck" feelings beginning to manifest within him.

Figuring he should go to the "theatre purpose room," as he called it, which basically had everything they needed for the productions they put on throughout the year. Once there, Armin just slid down the wall and sat, immersing himself in thought.

He was a bit upset with Eren as of late. It wasn't the first time that Eren had been kinda a dick to him, but recently it had been getting progressively worse. Armin figured something was up with his best friend, and that he should probably at least ask if something was wrong, but that didn't make him feel any better about getting treated like shit. Of course, he knew the bond between the two of them could never be broken, and that their friendship would never be endangered by something as silly as that. They had gone through so much worse, especially back in their sophomore year.

As Armin began to think about those memories, he immediately shook his head and stood up. He was going back to an area of his mind that he wanted to leave untouched for as long as he lived, and needed some sort of distraction. Wanting to wet his face a little, he turned the doorknob to open a door to one of the personal bathrooms.

"Someone's in here!" someone screamed, and Armin jumped at the sound. Again, he was so deep in thought before that he didn't hear anything else outside of his own mind. Immediately, he recognized the voice as Marco's.

"Marco? I didn't even notice you left the theatre. You must have been in here a while, is everything alright?" Armin questioned. He was right; Armin had been gone for a while, meaning that Marco must have been there for some time.

There was a moment of silence. "Yeah, I'm fine. I was just trying to wake up a bit. Still pretty tired," Marco replied after a few seconds, his voice hoarse. Armin assumed it was from a lack of sleep.

"You should try to sleep more then! You sound tired, too. Hopefully your sleeping schedule gets back on track soon, I know how screwed up they can get over the summer, my own included," Armin said, trying to offer some help to Marco as well as attempting to alleviate some of the unexplained awkwardness that began to creep over them.

"Yeah, I'll try my best to make sure it gets back to normal," Marco said, opening the door. His face was wet and his eyes were red. _He must have gotten no sleep,_ Armin deduced. Nodding and smiling, Marco quickly left the room.

Quickly entering the bathroom and closing the door, Armin leaned over the sink and stared into the mirror. His mind ran like an express train right back to the memories he thought he had just avoided. He began to think about how much he used to be in love with his best friend. About how he tried to hide it for years and years, somehow managing to keep his forbidden love a secret from the one person he loved the most.

Although he managed to keep his love a secret from Eren for so long, Armin couldn't help but to talk about his feelings with someone. At the start of freshman year, he knew he had to let some of his emotions out before he burst in an explosion that would probably have led to his life becoming an utter shitstorm. He couldn't tell Mikasa, because of course she would have had to tell Eren because she couldn't keep anything from him. He definitely couldn't tell Connie, nor Sasha, because although they were two really good friends of his, their mouths would have blabbered all over the school. He debated telling Ymir and Christa, considering they were basically all over each other non-stop, but figured that Ymir might tell Eren for her own amusement and that Christa would make it way too obvious that he had feelings for Eren when she was around them.

But as the year went on, Armin and Eren's friendship became uncomfortable for the both of them for unexplained reasons. Every time Armin and Eren would hang out alone, Armin would somehow find a reason to leave early and it would always upset Eren. Even though Armin was now publicly "out," neither of them figured anything would change between them because Armin had confessed his sexuality to Eren at a much younger age. Though unspoken tensions grew between the two of them over the year, they remained best friends throughout it all. It was a struggle for Armin to continue to hide his feelings for his best friend, but managed. However, he was extremely depressed. He would mentally scold himself whenever he looked at Eren in a romantic way, and although he managed to contain his feelings while maintaining his friendship, he began to hate himself more and more on a daily basis. His grades made a slight decline in the last marking period of his freshman year, and his summer was more than spent alone in his room crying silently or trying to distract himself from his feelings.

However, at the start of his sophomore year, he finally decided that he was going to tell someone. Once the ideas of self-harm and suicide popped into his head, he knew it was time to do something, anything, before he made any stupid decisions. The person he decided to confess to was none other than Reiner Braun, a man who became a somewhat-older-brother-type figure as school progressed. He wasn't too book-smart, but his social intelligence was well above par, and his advice was always extremely helpful. So, after finally building the courage, he finally approached Reiner and confessed to him.

_"Why are you afraid of telling him? If you're so sure that nothing will change, then why aren't you saying anything when it only hurts yourself?"_

The memorable words inspired Armin to tell Eren that exact day.

_"Armin, I'm sorry, I just don't feel that way about you or any guy. I love you to death, and you know that nothing is ever gonna get in between us, and this isn't gonna change anything for us. But we're never going to be together."_

The equally memorable words never proved more true to Armin. Over the next two years, Armin truthfully became happier. After confessing his feelings to Eren, he slowly was able to overcome them, and their friendship became stronger than ever before.

Armin bent over in the sink and repeatedly wet his face with his hands, filling them with water and then lightly splashing it onto his forehead, cheeks, and nose. Rubbing his face dry with a paper towel, he decided to once again put all those memories behind him. They didn't matter anymore, anyways. A new prince charming had came into his life and swept him off his feet, and he couldn't have been happier. Thinking about Jean, Armin put his hands to his heart to feel it beating so intensely that it might have popped out of body if his hands weren't there to stop it.

He thought back to when he and Jean first became close, towards the end of their junior year. They had been in AP World History together the entire year, and often worked on assignments together in class. While Armin knew Jean wanted to work with him because of his notorious intelligence, Armin thought Jean was incredibly attractive, so he naturally allowed his mind to be used. While Eren wasn't too happy about it considering how much he already disliked Jean, Armin simply ignored his words, since it was none of his business anyways. Armin and Jean continued to work together in class as well as study together outside of school hours, often meeting up in the library after school before days of quizzes and tests. Whenever Jean would smile at him during their work-sessions, Armin would melt a little inside, slowly developing feelings for him as the year progressed. Never even considering the idea that Jean could return those feelings, Armin brushed off every possible flirt from him as nothing notable. There was no substance to Jean's perfect smile, to his golden eyes, nor to his comments about how Armin was a "really cute kid." Armin considered every word and touch merely platonic. Yet, their friendship grew strong, and by the end of the year they wanted to start hanging out.

Armin knew he couldn't hang out with Jean without telling Eren, and to his expectation, Eren was furious. However, Armin quickly covered by saying Jean wanted to hang out with Eren as well and settle their differences. Armin, assuming that Jean would also invite Marco Bodt to hang out with them, plotted with Marco to trick Jean and Eren into thinking the other person wanted to be friends, and in the end, all differences were successfully put aside. The four of them began to hang out almost daily for the first part of summer, until one day Jean had asked Armin to hang out alone. From that point, many summer days and nights were spent hanging out with only Jean. When Jean had summer practice, Armin would often pick him up and they would get lunch together and just talk. Armin began to wonder whether Jean might actually like him as more than just a friend, and his suspicious were confirmed one summer night when Jean had slept over Armin's house, when Jean had crawled into Armin's bed and confessed his feelings in his ear.

They didn't let go of each other that night, and when morning came, they immediately discussed their feelings for one another. By night, they were an official couple. Armin was so extraordinarily happy about the situation and didn't think twice before calling Eren the moment Jean had left his house to tell him the news. Eren said he was happy for him, and life seemed to get even better as his days were often spent openly going out with his now-boyfriend. The remainder of his summer was spent mostly either hanging out in their friendly-foursome, sleeping over Jean's house or going out on romantic dates, or, towards the end, testing his sexual boundaries with his boyfriend. To Armin, Jean had the body of a god, and although he certainly wasn't ready to go all the way with him, he was definitely ready for something. By the end of summer, although they hadn't done much, it was certainly enough to satisfy the both of them, and he was content.

'And here we are, now...' Armin thought to himself, finally turning off the water after letting himself become yet again lost in his own mind.

Taking his phone out of his pocket, he saw that there were only 8 minutes left of the period before it ended. _I hope Mrs. Ral doesn't think I cut!_ Armin thought, quickly turning quickly to leave before looking down at the ground in disgust.

"Why the hell is their blood on the ground?" Armin said aloud, furiously looking at the few drops of red that lay on the bathroom floor, glistening under the light. He figured that it must have been from a girl who mishandled her tampon (being a homosexual male, he didn't know much about the menstrual cycle) and merely stepped over it before closing the door behind him and leaving to go back to the theatre. Once there, he returned to his seat next to Eren, who immediately faced him.

"You were in there for so long, what happened?" He asked, concerned.

"I was uhh, you know."

"Taking a shit?" Eren replied almost instantly.

"Yeah..?" Armin replied in a nervous manner, but instantly breaking out into a hushed laughter once he saw the smile on Eren's face.

"God damn Armin, just don't tell anyone about those bathrooms okay? They're like the cleanest ones and I don't want everyone flocking there to drop a load." Eren whispered jokingly.

"You're disgusting," he replied, smiling back at him and pushing him back. He had missed Eren's real smile, noting how rarely he's seen lately.

Their short conversation was halted by Mrs. Ral, who was now center stage. "Alright class," she began, "good work this summer! You all did an excellent job today, and I'm sure you'll all get even better by the end of this year! You have a few minutes left. Talk amongst yourselves, just make sure you don't leave anything in here! And also, no food or drinks in the theatre!" She pointed to a sophomore girl that Armin had seen around the school before, who nervously stood up and walked to the garbage can, throwing away a Starbucks cup of what was probably a pumpkin-spice latte.

"Oh yeah," Armin said, turning to his friends who sat beside him. "I was in the bathroom and there was period blood on the damn ground! I'm surprised you didn't notice it, Marco."

"OH MY GOD EW!" Christa yelped, covering her mouth as if she was going to vomit. Marco, meanwhile, simply looked mortified.

"Who the hell has their period on the first day of school, and first thing in the morning nonetheless? That's just gross." Eren added, his face contorted in a way that expressed his discontent.

"It's not like we can help when we have it," Christa interrupted, "but it's still disgusting that whoever was responsible didn't make sure she was being clean about it. That is so gross."

Eren scoffed. "Whatever, can we talk about something else?" And so they did until the bell rang, and each began to go their separate ways.

* * *

Exiting through the theater's side door, Armin was pleased to find Jean already waiting for him outside in front of a group of lockers, and walked to meet him.

"Ya miss me?" Jean said, coolly placing his hand on a locker over Armin's shoulder. Armin couldn't help but blush at Jean's successful attempt to seem suave. "Ehh," Armin said jokingly. And Jean didn't even look around to see who was there before smoothly placing a soft kiss on his forehead. Armin wasn't too fond of PDA, but he'd let this one slide. And tapped his shoulder to indicate that they should start walking.

"You excited for some AP US History?" Jean said, acting as over-excited as he possibly could.

"Yeah, thrilled," Armin said sarcastically. He really did like history, but wasn't too fond when the pace was so quick that many subjects had to be glossed over. He still did quite well in AP World, so he figured that he would see similar results in this class.

"You know I'm only taking this class so we can work together again, right?" Jean said menacingly.

"I had no idea," Armin said, again with a sarcastic tone. Jean jokingly frowned in such an exaggerating manner that Armin couldn't help but giggle. "I mean, could you really pass this class without me?" Armin said, winking at him.

"Hey," Jean said, nudging Armin before gently grabbing his hand and interlocking their fingers. "I can be smart too, especially when it comes to you." Armin's heart fluttered at the touch.

"That's true," Armin said quietly, tightening his grip on Jean's hand. He could feel Jean's smile through his fingers, and he knew that Jean could feel the same through his. When they reached the classroom, he reluctantly let go before Jean romantically opened the door and gestured for him to enter. Armin obliged, but not before smirking at his boyfriend.

The rest of the class went smoothly, with Mr. Bossard spending the entire time going over the class syllabus and a schedule he created for learning the material before the AP Exam. Armin and Jean, who sat next to each other, made faces at each other the entire time. Mina, who sat behind Armin, kicked the basket under Armin's desk when she caught them doing something stupid, and quietly controlled her laughter. Towards the end of the period she kicked the basket again before leaning over to quickly tap Jean's shoulder. Mr. Bossard had told to class to wait patiently while he fetched the copies he made of the last page of the schedule, which apparently didn't print correctly, so there was a minute of downtime while they waited. Armin and Jean both turned around to face Mina.

"Thomas is having a first-day-of-senior-year party tonight. Are you guys coming?" She asked, looking back and forth to the two boys.

"On a school night?" Armin replied, a bit hesitant.

Mina laughed before smiling at Armin. "Yeah, why not? I mean we're seniors, aren't we supposed to be having fun?" Armin smiled back at her, knowing that she was right. Armin wasn't too much of a party-guy, but he did realize that he would have to start having more fun before he graduated. He looked over to Jean to hear what his opinion on the matter was.

Jean's face was obviously full of excitement. "I am so down. Wanna go, Armin? Don't worry, I'll take care of you if you're too much of a lightweight."

Armin blushed at Jean's half-accusation about how he can't handle his liquor, which was probably true. "Alright, why not!" Jean and Mina both gave each other jokingly menacing looks before the teacher re-entered the room to finish his lecture. Turning back around, Armin still couldn't focus on what he was saying.

All he could think about was how happy he really believed he finally was.

* * *

_**A/N: Okay I'm sorry if that was bad and I'm sorry if there were lots of errors, it's a Sunday night and I still have homework and I really just wanted to get this up here. Thank you so much for reading and please follow/favorite/review if you liked it, and let me know if you have any critiques or anything you wanna share with me! Thankssomuch! :)**_


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